MonDie

I didn't see your response before I simplified the post, but I only clarified my original message. I suppose you only require a certain degree of certainty for something to be considered knowledge. Of course, that's part of science. You're not like Plato. But the level of certainty that's acceptable is determined arbitrarily, so others may have it set at different heights. It's like you're a criminal court judge, and TAR is a televised civil court judge that airs the audience's opinions before the commercial break.

iNow said TAR knew the deer was brown but didn't know the deer's thoughts. Actually, TAR only has a different level of certainty about each of these visual perceptions due to one being perceived more directly than the other. However, this doesn't apply if TAR perceived the deer's thoughts directly through supernatural faculties, which I'd be disinclined to believe.

His nature isn't elusive, it's imaginary.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_atheism

EDIT: I should ensure clear communication with my opponents before I argue.

My statements were based on the assumption that predictability is preceded by reason. Irrationality is the lack of reason. When I argued that religion can make predictable changes in response to historical events and/or human social nature, I was arguing that religion involves some reasoning even if it's bad reasoning. Next, I emphasized the role of rational individuals within the religious framework. I originally intended for the hypothetical religious leader's (irrational) transformation to be a contrast to the reasoning individuals, who buffer the irrationality. Finally, I concede that religion isn't entirely rational or irrational. However, I assumed that broader cultural factors that impact religion are thus part of religion. If that's not included in the definition of religion, my argument doesn't apply, and it becomes true that religion only contorts otherwise secular ideas into less rational dogmas even while preserving them.

I don't think Iggy's description is entirely accurate. Religion can be predictable, and there are buffers against its spontaneity. Some of the social norms reinforced by religion probably originated from historical events or natural tendencies, although that is not to say that the norms are justified. Religion continues to adapt to outside forces in ways that can be predictable. Many people change their religion rather than blindly follow the first one they see, and some theology students don't become priests because they see the greed that plagues churches, so one leader's transformation into a Hitler won't necessarily turn all the followers into Hitlers. Of course, this is not a black and white issue.

Maybe that was bad phrasing. I suppose "broke" would be the past-tense verb, and "broken" would be an adjective. Does the thread title state that they are broken or are being broken?

In the title, is the "broken" a verb or an adjective?

It would seem logical to assert that there is more potential for bias when there is more information present. Indeed, information overload usually causes people to take mental shortcuts. The Bible is huge, so even somebody who has read the entire thing will be unable to analyze all the information well unless they are actually tallying down the frequency of all the different types of statements made and such.

If I didn't take Social Psychology, I would have doubts about this statement. Research has shown that people will indicate a stronger belief in religion after they have contemplated death. I once read a testimony that when someone stopped believing in god at a young age, it bothered them that they would have to die.

But logic can be used to refute previously adequate explanations of our observations, and the good-enough concepts must be replaced with something more accurate. I've wondered if Einstein's theory of relativity could resolve Zeno's paradoxes of motion. Copy the webpage address because the hyperlink sends me to the wrong Wikipedia page. I had problems posting this link. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeno's_paradoxes#The_Paradoxes_of_Motion

When I was a little kid, I played DanceDanceRevolution quite intensely. When taking a break, I often hallucinated the rainbow colored arrows until I got a drink of water.

I was looking through books online again. I saw some books on denial of scientific findings and an interesting book called Science and the Media: Delgado's Brave Bulls and the Ethics of Scientific Disclosure. That book is probably unnecessary for me as a freshman college student, and it's too much money, but I thought it sounded interesting. Do you want to cover some history for me, or recommend a source of information that provides broad coverage. The title of my thread summarize what I want to know about. "(pseudo)sciences" was a shortened version of "astronomy and astrology; astronomy and religion; climate change, environmentalism, and religion; eugenics, genetics, and evolution; etc." In typing, "distortions, controversies, denial, ect," I meant anything concerning public opinion conflicting with scientific findings, the public's responses to scientific findings, scientific findings being misinterpreted or introduced to the public too quickly, etc.

I think I made a mistake. It's not considered an area of research as much as a method of research. Considering that it, itself, is a particular method of research, it probably has some scientific merit. Some pseudosciences hide their shortcomings by failing to set forth rules on research. It appears to be part of academia within sociolinguistics. http://www.cambridge.org/gb/knowledge/isbn/item6650114/Conversation%20Analysis/?site_locale=en_GB I was looking for an inexpensive book on the subject, but I couldn't find one. However, I was interested in this because I wanted to understand human interaction better, not because I wanted to do research.

What do you mean by "that kind of stuff?" Do you know anything about how the researchers usually conduct their experiments and what results they've gotten? My suspicion is that you are dismissing it as unscientific only because you have never read about it in any science literature.

Response to above: Most people don't remember the images from their dreams as much as they remember conceptions of what happened, although one can train their self to remember more of the former (images).

Are those bolded segments precise expressions of your concepts? I'm not requesting elaboration because that will probably wear down my concentration before I can gain any further insight. past experiences with other people

I read the article, and the alternative interpretation given above is still by far the best thing I can come up with. Their hypothesis was based on the dual process model, and with regard to my idea that uneducated people might doubt complex scientific concepts for the same reason the religious people doubted superstitions, I now mention that studies have shown that when an expert gives an explanation that is too confusing to follow, the listeners tend to take the peripheral route by simply trusting in the expert's opinion. However, I think they have more arguments for why religion is supported by intuitive thinking. Religious people usually justify their beliefs with personal experiences rather than appeal to authority, and interpretations of personal experiences can be strongly influenced by the type of intuitive thinking mentioned in the article.

How does the test of religious belief work? Maybe religious people are willing to express a little more doubt if that makes them seem more rational. Our culture has formed a popular image of the rational atheist. Also, even some Christian religions embrace prudence. The catholic church taught that nobody could know for sure that they were "in God's grace," which could be thought of as a sort of disbelief. Such ideals could have played a role in the experiment involving the statue although my idea is probably insignificant for the experiment involving the different fonts. Religions are only the products of less science-oriented cultures, and I doubt that any culture fundamentally lacks rational thinking. If the experimental conditions aren't just impacting conformity or aspiration toward an ideal of being intellectual, we might observe a similar result for uneducated people expressing belief or disbelief in concepts that are beyond their understanding. Of course, this is not an attack on science because science values doubt more than religion does.

The brain does a lot of stuff that the conscious mind is not aware of. Do you know about the split brain studies, or the way light sensation is changed into an image by the brain? Forgive my amendments to my account of this phenomenon. Especially when I'm tired, I can hear things in my mind. Although they are clearly imaginary and seem to be related to my more conscious thoughts, I don't anticipate them. It's as if my own thoughts are routed off to some other part of my mind, and a reaction thought is routed back to "me." Both the voices and their words are often familiar (e.g. someone I know calling my name). If that were my dream, the person at the door would have a revolver or a chainsaw. I've dreamed it before.

I though this subject would be more fitting for a social-sciences/sociology category, but there is none. Conversation Analysis is the study of the structure of verbal and non-verbal dialogue. According to the Wikipedia article, researchers analyse video-recorded dialogue. I read that Noam Chomsky thought conversation was too disorganized for in-depth analysis. http://en.wikipedia....sation_analysis The idea of people "enlist[ing] various mechanisms to obtain turns" sounds interesting. As always, I would appreciate book recommendations, although I'm not willing to spend much.

Thank you. I also found Grinstead and Snell's Introduction to Probability, which is free online. Introduction to Probability (Grinstead and Snell) is the same book. It apparently covers much more than discrete probability.

Is there a book that will introduce probability to me without requiring that I already know the maths involved. I want to learn the mathematics in the process. I know precaclulus but no calculus. I don't know any probability besides the little discrete probability I learned in precalculus I. I'm good at math. On a state-sponsored test administered during highschool, I scored in the ninety-fifth percentile of my school for mathematics, although I was never placed in an advanced class. Most books on probability are expensive, although I found a few books on probability or statistics that I can get for cheap. Probability: An Introduction (Goldberg) is approximately ten dollars, but despite the great ratings, it only goes over discrete probability. I found some book recommendations on this forum, but they're dated and still as expensive as other probability books. "Loeve's Probability Theory" has Amazon reviews saying it cannot be appreciated without a good background in math. http://www.sciencefo...duction__st__20

There's a lot you can do with eight hours a week.